Horseshoe



UNITED STATES PATENT oEFIcE.-

THOMAS H. FREEMAN, or LYNCH MINEsYKENTUCKY.

, HoRsEsH-on. j

To allzu/10mi?? may concern Be it known that I, THOMAS II. FREEMAN, acitizen of the United States, residing at Lynch Mines, in the county ofHarlan and State of Kentucky, have invented certain new and usefulImprovements in Horseshoes; and I do hereby declare the following to bea full, clear, and exact description of the invention, such as will'enable others skilled in the art to whichl it appertains to make andusethe same. j

This application is a division of my application Serial No. 328,377,filed October' t, 1919, and patented November 23, 1920, as Number1,360,204. f

An object of the invention is to provideY a comfortable shoe for a horseor mule that affords the animal a goed hold upon thev ground withoutraising his toe abnormally above the surface upon which he is walking. Afurther object is to produce a form of horseshoe that may bemanufacturedeconomically.

The invention comprises a horseshoe having a toe calk and a cavity inthe thread surface of the shoe'rearward of the base of the calk, wherebya firm hold upon the ground may be obtained by the animal, wearing ashoe with a shallow calk, because not only does the calk penetrate theground to 'a depth determined by the extent of the shoe viewed from theunder side, or looking e toward the tread surface;

F ig. 2 is a sectional View on the line 2-2 of Fig. 1; and

Fig. 3 is a perspective of the improved shoe.

In said drawings the shoe or shoe blank as a whole is indicated by theletter A. The toe calk 1 is formed integrally with the body of the shoeand is, preferably, projected*k above the tread surface to a Suitableextent specification of Lettersratentv. Patented May 17,r 192.1.

`original application filed October 4, 1919, Serial No. 328,377;`Divided and this application filed Decemv ber 13, 1920. Serial No.430,354 e l .sufficient to accomplish the purposes of my invention, butnot, as will be observed, tno an excessive extent or to the extentcustomaryin shoes having calks designed to give a firm grip on slipperyground. Rearward of the calk is a depression or cavity 2 preferablyforged into the tread surface of the slice, in suoli mannen as to strikeup the calk. The front wall of the depression coincides with the rearwall 2a of the calk. By the described construction an extent of rearwall is provided on the calk 1 which is practically twice as great asina calk projecting to the same height above the tread surface if therewere no depression 2, and the toe of the horse is therefore not liftedabnormally from the ground. A horse or mule when walking not having toexert a strong pull, does not dig his toes into the ground. The presenceof Va lon calk is undesirable for a normally walking animal. When,however, a horse or mule is pulling hard he digs his ytoes into theearth.` At such times an animal wearing my improved shoe can obtain asgood a hold upon the surface as he can with shoes with the customarylong calk, while at the same time the animal may be comfortable whenwalking easily Vand dragging no heavy load.

A horseshoe'having the defined structure may be manufactured in anysuitable manner. nary curved horseshoe blanks by a forging operation,the metal being displaced from the cavity 2 and caused to flow into thepart forming the calk 1, as is fully'disclosed andr claimed in myaforesaid patent, of which this application is a division. f

I have found that this calk does not wear away as quickly as.' ordinarycalks since the cavity in its rear with its front wall merging into therear wall of the calk tends to keep said calk sharp. Even when calk 1Vis worn down fiush with the tread surface 3 of the slice A it still hasa very considerable holdingcapacity and gives the animal a good gripupon the ground in the effort to get a firm footing. The calk 1 may beoriginally formed so as to extend flush with the tread surface of theshoe, and vstill possess good ground-gripping capacity owing to thepresence of the cavity.

Y The said cavity or depression rearward of thecalk is additionalto andwider than 1 Vprefer to form the calk from ordithe usual nail creasesand separate therefrom.

Havingdescribed my invention in such manner as to enable those skilledin theart to make and use the same, what I claim and desire to secure byLetters Patent is:

l. A horseshoe having` the usual nail creases and a depression in itsgeneral tread surface adjacent the toe of the shoe additional to andWider than the nail creases, that portion between the front Wall of thebeyond the general tread surface of the shoe, 15

and a depression in said general tread surface rearward ot said calli,said call: having its rear Wall merging into the fro'nt Wall of Y saiddepression-` In testimony whereof I affix my signature. 20

THOMAS H. FREEMAN.

